♦ Organic Creation Catalyst ♦
♦ Organic Creation Catalyst ♦
Killzone Shadow Fall was the launch title for PS4 and I worked for six months on the game as part of my internship at Guerrilla Games. During this period, I designed the vertical container transportation and storage infrastructure for the Container City in the Helgast section.
“A bustling metropolis befitting a wealthy planet with close ties to the UCN, the city is home to several tourist traps and luxurious shopping malls. Originally the City was built by the Helghan Corporation and was the site of the Helghast surrender in the First Extrasolar War. Over the years the city grew larger. It has several districts dedicated to spacecraft maintenance and housed a large portion of the Vektan ISA’s planetary army garrison.
Towering walls separate the cities and communities of the Vektan and Helghast people, with both living starkly contrasting lives on either side of the walls. The Vektans live in a well-designed urban landscape with clean energy devices such as water falls to provide power to many buildings and a sprawling railway system crosses the city. The Helghast live in mobile dormitories that circle many factories. Tensions are constantly high in areas bordering these walls, with one of the main points of violence being the border areas that separate the ISA and Helghast sections of Vekta City.”
This matt painting communicates overall mood of the Helghast section of Vekta and is a combination of 3d, photographs and digital painting.
Container City underwent numerous iterations under the art direction of Guerilla Games before taking its final form.
Container City Mock-Up
3D mockups were used to test the scale and placement of various elements. The motion of the transport cranes was communicated to the rest of the development team through 3d animation.
Knowledge from Industrial Design Engineering is directly applicable to the design of (interactive) virtual worlds. The development cycle is significantly shorter here, as the virtual worlds pose less restrictions.
Working with (for now) unrealistic solutions is what makes Concept Art so fun.
The screenshots below show the final Container City from the Player’s perspective in the game.